Does a Stallions age matter?

[Naki 13]

Just looking into sending a mare to Volksraad. He seems to be under the rader abit and yet still leaving winners.

[nike 0]

No. usually they tend to serve less mares.

[reng 0]

Simple answer is yes. I did an article on this for Breeding and Racing last year (give them a bell to get a back copy).

Once a stallion reaches age 16, his ratio of stakes winners to foals drops off. however, for a horse like Volksraad whose first crop was something like 20%SW/foals, he's probably still going better than average (even if not as good as when he started out).

[Overdale 0]

Simple answer is yes. I did an article on this for Breeding and Racing last year (give them a bell to get a back copy).

Once a stallion reaches age 16, his ratio of stakes winners to foals drops off. however, for a horse like Volksraad whose first crop was something like 20%SW/foals, he's probably still going better than average (even if not as good as when he started out).

Reng, could this be partly due to the perception that age depreciates a stallions worth..leading to a decline in the 'quality'of mares he gets?

[2piglets 0]

Lot 1228 in Festival sale 2010 Star Way colt out of Peripherique. Theres an ageing couple.

[reng 0]

I did try and take that into account in my article, and the opposite applies.

Generally an average or bad stallion doesn't get to be around for that long, so the older stallion stats tend to get skewed by the better stallions (who are usually the only ones who are still at stud in their latter years).

So even though only the better stallions are at stud in their older years, there is still a drop off in their performance (especially when compared to their performance when they were young).

Some good quotes from Sir PH on Sir Tristram in the article. I can probably dig out a pdf copy somewhere, otherwise there might be one on my website.

[Naki 13]

Thank you all for your insights

[Henri Jooste 40]

This is a topic which can be debated at length. The general consensus is that over time the ratio of stallions stakes winners to foals declines. The confounding factor is that stallions books of mares vary in numbers and quality over time so it is not clear cut that if all factors remained constant that the change would have statistical significance. I have selective data that shows that good sires maintain a satisfactory ratio of stakes winners to foals even into their early twenties. Reng has published a very good article on the subject which shows deterioration over time, however the sample was not robust enough to persuade me not to use older sires. (Reng if you can please put it up as it is well worth reading)

The recently deceased Red Ransom in his twenties has just had his best season in years, simply because he had his best books of mares in Australia in the preceding seasons. How many sires ever have that happen to them ? - very few. More Than Ready is heading in the same direction and I suspect that after the demise of Danehill the stats for Flying Spur improved (need to check on that) because he served mares that would otherwise have been served by Danehill.

There is no escaping the fact that some sires do show a marked deterioration in the quality of their offspring for no apparent reason. Everyone can think of a number of sires that struck with their first or second crop never to repeat anything near that success again. Its just one of the many unknown quirks of this business.

Even if it were true and there was a change of statistical significance you would probably still be better off making use of a stallion that was still capable of producing stakes winners as opposed to a new unproven sire who may not get anywhere near the stakes producing ability of the older proven sire. Hell I would rather take my chances on a sire that is still getting 4% stakes winners as opposed to the 6 % that he used to. You may well end up with a filly on your hands. If you end up keeping her you could have something to breed on with if she is by a proven older sire as opposed to an unproven sire that turned out to be a dud.

If you have a mare that is compatible with Volksraad then have a go would be my advice.

[reng 0]

Ultimately that was my conclusion too - a proven older stallion generally still produces a better chance of a stakes winner than an unproven young stallion.

In terms of numbers, 9 out of 10 new stallions will fail to do better than 1.5%SW/foals. An older proven stallion, like Zabeel or Volksraad, will be doing better than 1.5%SW/foals - even though their production is less than it was when they are young.

Most definitely go for V-dub if you have the mare - the added bonus of an older sire is that you also can see what has worked with him and what hasn't.

[matt 0]

If anyone doesn't know Renee's website, here's a direct link to her article for your perusal.

http://www.dekabat.com/UserFiles/File/sires-age.pdf